a carfirmation. hey, this is challenger. i'll be waiting for you in stall 5. it confirms your reservation and the location your car is in, the moment you land. it's just another way you'll be traveling at the speed of hertz. america is on the cusp of gun safety reform. and also, somehow miles and miles and miles away from it. it's friday, april 12th and this is "now." yesterday in a rare appearance, sanity poked its head out on capitol hill. on thursday afternoon, the senate voted to end the gop's filibuster on gun safety legislation. clearing the way for at least a debate on the issue. families of the victims of newtown watched from the senate gallery as 68 senators, including 16 republicans, voted

to allow consideration of the legislation. and with the victims' families as witnesses, two democrats, senators mark pryor of arkansas and mark begich of alaska, alongside 29 republicans, voted to prevent the legislation from seeing debate. this is the first piece of major gun safety legislation to be considered in the senate in two decades, and although a major hurdle was cleared, the road ahead will be a vertical climb as the amendment process begins next week. it is a process "the new york times" calls quote, more treacherous than thursday's vote. after the vote, harry reid prepared his colleagues for what's to come. >> the hard work starts now. >> and he is right. according to ar editorial in the "new york times," the gun lobby has lined up senators to do its bidding by offering amendments that will pose a real threat to the background check bill. these amendments if passed would do more than simply take the teeth out of the reform efforts, they would be devastating. there's an nra-supported amendment that would require every state to honor handgun

permits of other states. there is an amendment proposed by lindsay graham, to allow people who have been involuntary committed to mental institutions to own guns. and there is another amendment that would lift the ban on gun ownership for mentally ill veterans. if you think these amendments sound like pie in the sky proposals with no shot of passage in the democratically-held senate, think again. experts say these amendments have a shot, and could be likely to pass. in 2009, an amendment to allow people to bring handguns to amtrak trans, on amtrak trains passed with the support of 28 democrats. months earlier a bill allowing guns to be carried into national parks passed, again, with democratic support. yesterday, in the "washington post," chris cillizza and paul cain wrote about the nightmare amendment scenario, argue that given the math, it's easier to

imagine amendments favored by gun rights advocates than amendments on things like renewing the assault weapons ban or limiting or outright banning high-capacity magazines. even if the senate imagines to emerge from the debacle with a solid bill, the bill must still pass in the house. surprising exactly no one, speaker john boehner didn't seem exactly eager to take up the legislation. >> i fully expect that the house will act. in some way, shape or form. but to make a blanket commitment without knowing what, what the underlying bill is, i think would be irresponsible on my part. joining me today, washington bureau chief at the the "huffington post," ryan grimm, vanessa is a contributor at "new york magazine," and bob herbert at dimos and ben smith from buzz feed is here.

i don't want to be a naysayer, yesterday we were having a fairly good day, democrats and republicans were working together and it seemed like for the first time the filibuster efforts were being put down. but when you look at the path ahead, for gun safety legislation, it is far more difficult, i think than a lot of people actually realize. given this open amendment process. >> i think that's right. lindsay graham is working on an alternative bill, alternative gun bill far to the right. and he guessed the other day that he thinks he has a majority for it. so you know, the question here is, whether or not you need 50 or 60 votes to get some of these things through. that's kind of going to decide you know, what, what ends up prevailing. now the reason that reid didn't use this new filibuster reform rule that he has to get past this hurdle the other day, is because then amendments only need a 50-vote threshold. so he went the traditional route. then they browbeat republicans in the press and got them to agree to cloture so they could

get on the bill in a normal way. if they can have a 60-vote threshold for things like graham's bill and some of these other crazier things, they set up a fight on filibuster on the procedure to move to the final vote. then you'll see this exact same argument shaking out. they won't even let the victims have a vote. don't filibuster the vote. you can vote against final passage. but don't filibuster the vote. then you're in a situation where you're not just proceeding to debate. you're actually letting democrats proceed to actual final passage. so you could see if there's another public pressure, a bill passed the senate with fewer than 60 votes. the. >> the caveat of enough public pressure is an important one, ben. yesterday, a 68-31 margin for a lot of people skeptical about gun safety reform efforts was sort of a positive sign that that many republicans would join in the effort, that the filibuster would be defeated. how long does that last? i mean i guess the question is, how real is, are the prospects for reform? how real is sort of the, the

atrophying of intransigence, are we just in a different place? or are they going to kind of come back and try to gum up the works through this amendment process? >> i think the thing is that this, the bill even in the best case scenario for democrats to pass is the lowest-hanging fruit, the most modest of the, of various things that obama has proposed that gun control advocates have proposed. but it's also the way these things change, is not in one session of congress. it's over the long-term. you see pat toomey sticking his head out a little like what's going to happen when he's up for re-election in pennsylvania. over the next few years that some of the republicans who have been a little soft for the gun lobby here, who are going to get challenged from the right. who are going to take flack from the right. but who are also going to run in general elections and use this to their advantage. this is that image that you guys have up of pat toomey and mansion is going to be his re-election commercial in pennsylvania. where ed rendell for years ran successfully against the nra. >> even then i was talking to some democrats who were praising

pat toomey, in fact maybe that was a bad thing to do. because -- >> if pat toomey gets beaten in a primary like this that will stiffen the spine of every republican to never touch this thing again. >> pat toomey invented the primary from the right, so that would be the final irony. >> is there ever such a thing as the final irony? >> that would be it. >> bob, i want to ask, ben touches on this. this is a long game and not a short game. but there are various schools of thought about how much, if the mansion/toomey bill ends up getting signed into law, how much of a victory that exactly is. and ezra klein today has an analysis. he says not every bill that's an improvement on the status quo is better than nothing. a law that claims to have solved a problem only to prove completely ineffective in the real world can undermine the belief that the problem can even be solved. >> and this is a bill, or at least this, this low-hanging fruit that we're talking about, i think we won't do much of

anything. even if it were, even if it were to pass. you know this gun registration, even without the poison pill amendments and that sort of thing. the question becomes, what is your goal. if your goal is to improve public safety, do you want to stop these homicides? do you want to stop suicides? you have to figure out what's the best way to get there. there's a difference between say the mass shootings in a movie theater or a college campus or a public school, and the kind of day-to-day killings that occur in our big cities and poorer areas and rural areas and that sort of thing. and there's no rhyme or reason in the course of this debate, on how to get from here to there. so i think that this is a lot of noise about very little, frankly. i am a nay-sayer on the way the gun debate has unfolded. >> it will be interesting. because vanessa, to see where the american public ends up on this, right? i think the thing that makes this moment different is the participation of the president and the first lady on the issue. the fact that the families of

newtown victims were on the hill and politico has an analysis, great reporting today, about just how savvy they were in terms of getting in front of congresspeople, sitting them down, talking about the second amendment, working with lobbyists, working inside the system, which is not something we've seen before. the idea that sunlight. the idea that attention, eyeballs, the bully pulpit, that all worked in concert to get us to at least this point. >> do get this kind of bill would be a wonderful legacy for these poorer children and their families. obviously i mean to me, i couldn't imagine when you watched you know this ridiculous carnival, these poor children were killed and then you have like the ghoulish wayne lapierre getting up there, talking about these 15-year-old cultural references like you know, "natural born killers" and "american psycho." it's all about the culture and thereby we should be able to have our guns and do whatever we want with them.

i couldn't imagine we weren't looking at massive kind of reforms. the fact that we're even discussing whether it's okay to discuss this -- just seems i don't know, it is a bit disheartening. >> do you think american culture has shifted? wayne lapierre has certainly shifted to the right. but there was a time when we had an assault weapons ban. i feel that there's a sense that something has to happen. >> right. >> and even if it's just background checks, i don't think that's going to satisfy the american public. i think there's a real desire for change. you look at -- >> the assault weapons would be great. i think that it's worth putting on the table, let's talk about some of this cultural stuff. i think we need to reduce the culture of violence. if we have to talk about video games, not having the assault weapons, functions on the joystick -- that's fine with me and that's something that you know, liberals might think, touches censorship. maybe they can give a little bit on that issue and we can see that we're all coming to the

table to try to you know, make some fixes here. >> i do think that the most important thing that's going on now is the media attention that's being paid to gun violence in the country. because that is a way to begin to shift the culture. i have absolutely no confidence, though, in congress. as it's presently constituted to do anything significant about gun violence. >> the other thing we haven't talked about, ryan, is if it does pass the senate, if you have some background checks intact. you still have beacons of reason. michele bachmann, steve stockman, who invited ted nugent to the state of the union. paul brown who has called evolution a lie straight from the pit of hil. these are people who are trying to say you can't even bring this to the floor of the house, a majority of republicans have to support it. how strong is john boehner going to be in the face of the tide of crazy? >> i think he might actually

want to see something done. if the senate does pass something, i think the house will at least want to have a serious vote. because as each massacre has happened, the time between the massacre and the national discussion about gun control has kind of gotten smaller. to the point where after newtown, that day, people were talking about gun control and gun safety. >> we were talking about it on the show when it was happening. >> and the program folks, ability to tamp down that discussion, failed them that moment. so i think what they're going to recognize is that when is not an if, unfortunately, when there's another massacre, that discussion will happen again. and the legislation, you know, the kind of drive for legislation will be that much stronger and so you might get that much more. now if republicans do a little bit, now, they might be able to say well, we tried and look, it didn't work. people are still killing each other. but if they do zero, then they're going to be up against a wall. >> and you know, we have to bear in mind that john boehner is

going to have to deal with, he sees what's coming down the pipeline and it is not pretty. and i think if one thing can be thrown away and that he would probably be happy to throw away, it is the hastert rule. crumble it up and throw it away in a ball. >> the hastert rule is how powerful the speaker is the speaker's control of his caucus, whether he can push them into line. more than it is about republican power. bits boehner's power and the way it works in the house is that the speaker is not that strong. >> ben smith with the euphemisms. coming up, will north korea light the fuse on an international crisis or will the u.s., china and russia band together to take the matches away. we get a live report from andrea mitchell who is on the korean peninsula. but first, republican senator rand paul knows what america needs. >> i think it's important that people know that for the country to get better it needs more than just politicians. politicians aren't enough. it needs a resurgence through churches, through revivals,

through a spiritual cleansing of the people. >> this week senator paul attempted a little personal spirit-cleansing of his own. offering students at howard university, the rand paul version of civil rights history. coming up next. [ male announcer ] when these come together, and these come together, one thing you can depend on is that these will come together. delicious and wholesome. some combinations were just meant to be. tomato soup from campbell's. it's amazing what soup can do.

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it is unclear if rand paul knows what century this is. on wednesday, paul gave a speech at howard university, an historically black college. paul's speech is part of a conservative republican rebrand, which includes outreach to

minorities. at howard paul tried to sway hearts and minds by reminding his audience of the roots of the grand old party. >> who did the republican party, the party of the great emancipator lose the trust in faith of an entire race? >> how did the party of the great emancipator lose the trust and faith of the entire race. after all, the republican party elected the first african-american senator. how could an entire race forget that? at least rand paul remembered. kind of. >> i'll give you one example, the first one of the african-american u.s. senators was a guy named -- blanking on his name from massachusetts. edwin brooks. >> no, nod edwin brooks. but edward brook. lesson nourm one, if you're planning to highlight the university where you're speaking a person who embodies the

principles you're trying to prove that the republican party still stands for -- know his name. lesson number two, taking credit for something your party did 50 years ago is a weak argument, especially when it no longer applies and you yourself are only 50 years old. there are currently 44 african-american members of congress, one is a republican. rand paul took a shot at another historical reference, the founding of the naacp. >> i mean how many of you would have, if i would have said, who do you think the founders of the naacp are. do you think they were republicans or democrats, would everybody in here know they were all republicans? >> yes. all right. you know more than i know. and -- i don't mean that to be insulting, i don't know what you know. i mean i'm trying to find out what the connection is. >> and therein lies a problem. it is insulting. the republican party as rand paul himself admitted, doesn't know what the african-american community knows or what it is

that they want. and his speech saying i care, or in this case, my party once several decades ago cared, isn't going to change that. the great rnc autopsy of 2013 called for greater engagement with minority voters and just yesterday, the party hired a state party director to oversee this. rnc chair raince priebus went to brooklyn last month. but the day-long voyages to a black planet don't change the reality of current republican policies. >> the democrat promise is tangible. it puts food on the table. but too often i think doesn't lead to jobs. or meaningful success. >> if the progressive agenda strengthens the american social compact, the current republican agenda takes a knife to it. if democrats put food on the table. republicans take it off the table. in the budget constructed and written by rand paul himself two weeks ago, he attempts to unwind basic social safety net problems and block grants, welfare program like medicaid, food stamps and child nutrition.

if rand paul intended to convince his audience of the righteousness of the right wing, perhaps he should have better considered the policy he was trying to sell. rather than assuming a recitation of historic touchstones would convince a group of well-educated college students. his attempts at history underscored his own sins of the past which were on full display. >> no republican questions or disputes civil rights. i've never wavered in my support for civil rights or the civil rights act. >> paul protested that he had never wavered in his support for the civil rights act. which might have been true, except for that time when -- paul wavered in his support for the civil rights act. >> would you have voted for the civil rights act of 1964? >> i like the civil rights act in the sense that it ended discrimination in all public domains and i'm all in favor of that. >> but? >> you had to ask me the but. i don't like the idea of telling

private business owners, i abhor racism. think it's a bad business decision to ever exclude anybody from your restaurant. but at the same time i do believe in private ownership. >> in the end, rand paul's pitch to minorities boiled down to once upon a time republicans did the right thing. unfortunately for the gop, that argument is only really truly effective among people who were alive once upon a time. for republicans to truly win over minorities, it will take a modern agenda, modern policies and substantive engagement. otherwise, the rnc report, the autopsy, really will be just that -- a post-mortem on a body long since deceased. ne, bjorn earns unlimited rewards for his small business. take these bags to room 12 please. [ garth ] bjorn's small business earns double miles on every purchase every day. produce delivery. [ bjorn ] just put it on my spark card. [ garth ] why settle for less? ahh, oh! [ garth ] great businesses deserve unlimited rewards. here's your wake up call. [ male announcer ] get the spark business card from capital one and earn unlimited rewards.

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pentagon's defense intelligence agency, the office tasked with monitoring the missile capabilities of adversary nations, made public at a house hearing by republican representative, doug lambborn. >> quoting from the unclassified portion, which i believe has not been made public. they said quote, d.i.a. assesses with moderate confidence, the north currently has nuclear weapons capable of delivery by ballistic missiles. however the reliability will be low. >> lamborn's comments led the administration to issue a series of statements walking back the idea that north korea has the capability to launch a missile equipped with a nuclear weapon. arriving in seoul for meetings with allies in the region, secretary of state john kerry addressed the conflicting reports. >>s did inaccurate to suggest that the dprks that fully tested, developed or demonstrated capabilities that are articulated in that report. >> at the white house, president obama took a moment to reassure

the nation and its partners. >> the united states will take all necessary steps to protect its people and to meet our obligations under our alliances in the region. >> tomorrow secretary kerry will travel to china to hold talks with the only nation believed to be capability of putting the brakes on the north's nuclear ambitions. >> the key to this is china. the chinese can control what the north koreans do. >> following its third nuclear test in february and the launching of a miss until december that reached as far as the philippines, north koreans have been gun celebrating the country's biggest national holiday. the april 15th birthday of leader kim jong un's grandfather. u.s. officials believe that kim jong un could mark the occasion at any time with a test of a launch of a medium-range missile capable in theory of reaching the u.s. territory of guam. joining us from seoul is nbc news chief foreign affairs correspondent and host of

"andrea mitchell reports," andrea mitchell. you're in seoul right now traveling with the secretary of state. could you give us an update on sort of how the u.s. state department is thinking about this situation. it obviously seems to be a fluid one. >> well, first of all, they are saying to kim jong un as secretary kerry did today, don't do it. you are already more provocative than you have a right to be by any global standard. he had a long meeting today with president park, the first woman leader here, the new leader of south korea. and he's basically saying that we will defend japan, we'll defend south korea unconditionally. so we will win this fight against north korea. if they were to attack. the real concern is miscalculation. we talked to a senior official who said this young leader, untested, erratic. we don't know what he will do and what they're trying to do is say to president park, don't retaliate. we've got your back. and so far, there seems to be a commonality of view between

south korea and the united states. as you pointed out. china is the great unknown. because china has the maximum leverage over north korea, the economic ties and it's only china that could persuade kim jong un to back down if he is at all persuadable. and that has not yet happened. so of course, we're leaving in the morning for beijing to see if they can have some, some really frank talks with the new leader in china. >> andrea, you mentioned china and david ignatius has an analysis in the "washington post" this morning that says effectively kim jong un has miscalculated how the chinese and the russians will react to this. that in fact they're in lock-step with the u.s. on this and that the u.s. may have partners in china and russia in trying to stop the north's nuclear ambitions. >> i think that's the hope. certainly russia, the foreign minister lavrov in london with kerry and the last couple of days, on his way here, was very supportive.

but china is still unknown. because they have said the right things up to a point. they have not been as blunt or as direct privately as the u.s. frankly hopes that they would be. so this is a new chinese president, and this is a big test for this new leadership. china was frankly very concerned about the obama administration's stated so-called pivot to asia. which implied more military strength and more of a show of force here. this was long before the north korean threat became so real. and so now china is kind of in a box. because this justifies everything that the u.s. is committing. the fly-over of the b-2s and the f-22s, the stealth flyovers which were sent as a signal of support to the south koreans and certainly a signal to the north. what he's saying is kim jong un will not win this fight. the first 24 hours when we have trops arrayed to the south of

the dmz and our south korean allies, the first 24 hours would be brutal and that's when their 800,000-man army would with tactical nuclear weapons and other weapons, would go through the dmz like butter and reach the other side and you know, seoul is only 35 miles away. and it is a very developed, brilliant economy here all the way up to the dmz. practically all the way to the dmz, frankly, alex when i first came here in 1984 with ronald reagan, it was barren mountains between the dmz and this city. now it's transformed. this is one of the world's global leading economies. and that is the contrast that kerry is trying to stress. if he can get through to the people of north korea. but of course he can't, they are hermetically sealed. >> andrea, before we let you go, because you're there and because of the grave threat and imminent threat in some ways, to the people of seoul, to the people of south korea, what is the mood on the ground there? we're getting reports in north korea of celebrations in advance of the landmark birthday on

april 15th. how are the south koreans responding? what is the sense there among the people? >> well i have to tell you, there were two trade shows of the two hotels that i was in today. some military officials, u.s. military officials had just come from a u.s.o. celebration, there was a spring fling at the american embassy. people here are going about their business, their government is certainly concerned. but they had a meeting, president park had a meeting with international business investors yesterday to reassure them. tourism has dropped. flights to south korea are off by about 6% i'm told this month compared to this month a year ago. so there is some effect. and it could begin to bite. but the people of seoul are used to bluster from the north. and they seem very unconcerned. >> thank you so much for your reporting, andrea, we'll be checking in with you as the situation develops, please be safe out there. how a trio of college boys, chicago boys, not college boys,

chicago boys ascended to the upper echelons of medics and politics and hollywood. one brother joins us to explain what was in the emanuel water supply, coming up next on "now." oh, he's a fighter alright. since aflac is helping with his expenses while he can't work, he can focus on his recovery. he doesn't have to worry so much about his mortgage, groceries, or even gas bills. kick! kick... feel it! feel it! feel it! nice work! ♪ you got it! you got it! yes! aflac's gonna help take care of his expenses. and us...we're gonna get him back in fighting shape. ♪ [ male announcer ] see what's happening behind the scenes at ducktherapy.com. [ male announcer ] see what's happening behind the scenes we replaced people with a machine.r,

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and last year, she wasn't eating so well. so i recommended boost complete nutritional drink to help her get the nutrition she was missing. and now she drinks it every day. well, it tastes great! [ male announcer ] boost has 26 essential vitamins and minerals, including calcium and vitamin d to support strong bones, and 10 grams of protein to help maintain muscle. and our great taste is guaranteed or your money back. learn more at boost.com [ dietitian ] now, nothing keeps mom from doing what she loves... being my mom. one brother is the mayor of chicago, and the former white house chief of staff. one is hollywood's most powerful agent and another is a bioethicist and a former policy adviser for president obama. the emanuel brothers have been called the jewish kennedys. after years of being asked what their mother put in their breakfast cereal to produce such a successful trio. zeke emanuel explores the answer to that question in a new memoir, ygs brothers emanuel."

the three emanuel brothers rahm, ariel and zeke were growing up on the north side of chicago. while there may have been no secret sauce or spiked breakfast cereal, the family was hardly ordinary. sort of like growing up next to an airport runway where everyone in the neighborhood becomes accustomed to the noise. in our home, everyone shouted and argued about everything. there may have been a lot of shouting and roughhousing but it was their parents' deep commitment to being parents to education, to intellectual discourse and to freedom that laid the foundation for the brothers' success, there were family meetings to explore what was on everyone's minds, the fourth bedroom, designated a child study when the brothers were all under the age of six, the family attended civil rights protests with their mother and talked politics at the dinner table. in the age-old debate of nature versus nurture. growing up emanuel floats the

idea that it's a little bit of both. dr. zeke emanuel's memoir and he joins us from cleveland, the vice provost from global initiatives at the university of pennsylvania, pearlman school of medicine and a former white house adviser for health policy in the obama administration. all of those titles go to prove the point of how incredibly disgustingly successful your family is. great to have you on the show. >> nice to be here, thank you. >> i think there's always huge amounts of intrigue around successful people, let alone successful families. what just stood out to me in this memoir is this righteous, loving and boisterous and decidedly intellectual environment in which you grew up. want you to tell us a little bit the i'll read an excerpt from the notion of sharing a bedroom. you wrote there was something about sharing a room that made easy for us to develop an intense vefl of loyalty and trust. we tested ourselves against each other and in the unguarded moments before we fell asleep, we confessed our worries and

hopes and practiced a boys' version of empathy. important counteremotional skills to develop, empathy alongside aggression and curiosity. >> yeah. i think that is a, some people think a rare combination. but i think everyone who works with any one of the three brothers recognizes that we're incredibly warm, we're incredibly loyal to people who work with us, we give them a lot of responsibility. but we're also hyper-competitive, we set goals, we push people. i don't think that's that much of a contradiction, if it is a contradiction, we hold it pretty well together and i think it is something we did grow up with from our parents. and learned by sharing a bedroom. >> there's been a lot, zeke, there's been a lot of maligning of intellectualism in the 21st century. one party tends to malign it more than another. intellectual rigor, exploration of ideas, arguments to support

one's position seems to have been in the water supply at the emanuel household. >> it was an expectation my grandfather on my mother's side said you had to have a political opinion and more importantly you had to justify it the other thing they made clear is, it didn't matter who you were, you corb the 6-year-old at the table or the 70-year-old at the table, everyone's view was valid. if they could give a good argument and justification for that. i think that pushing each other to make the best argument, whether it was politics or culture or sports or whatever was pretty much part of our family. >> i want to bring in our panel a little bit here, bob. do you think we have gotten away from a culture of intellectualism broadly speaking in america? >> we've definitely gotten away from a culture of intellectualism. i think we're paying a serious price for that. i'd like to ask dr. emanuel how much of this -- attitude that the family has can be sent out

to the broader culture. so we have a very hypercompetitive culture. it seems to me as if we might not need a culture that leans a little bit more on cooperation than we do right now. >> and empathy, for sure. >> i think that's a great question. it wasn't just the competitiveness, we had this warmth that was present, we had this support. my mom was both pushy, but also indulged us as i've said, any crazy idea we had. so one of the things that was true in my house is my grandfather in the food business, brought home a heart and lungs from a cow so i could dissect them because i was the kid interested in biology and science and my parents you know, if we set up a card table in the family room, i dissected it. if i wasn't done the first round, with my friend jerry, glass, we put it back in the freezer with all the meats, we took it out, we dissected. we had it in there for a year. any time we had you know, once

in sixth grade, we wanted to build a scale model of a castle for a project on the middle ages with my neighbor, mitch cohen, it was on the floor of the family room for weeks and months. and my parents indulged us those things. the other thing i would say is that they were very, very good about making sure that inside the competitiveness, was also not celebrating too much when we succeeded. and not being sort of self-pitying when we failed. and those are very, very important. and the last thing i would say is, and this is very important for parents, raising their kids, is we were late bloomers. i've said this over and over again. we did not come out of high school or even college with everyone saying, they're destined to succeed, these are geniuses. everyone recognizes it. far from it we were sort of pretty average, i was good in high school. but by no means the best. rahm was middling.

ari was a good athlete, but by no means state champion in lots of sports. so i think you know, life is a long, long time. it's now you know, average life span is 80 years, you don't have to succeed at kindergarten to end up being a successful person. >> dr. emanuel, one thing that i think your book seems to diverge from the parenting manuals you get in park slope these days, was the level basically of physical violence. do you think kids are raised too soft to become the rahm emanuals and zeke emanuels these days. >> my mother claimed she was a pacifist and, but she couldn't prevent us from roughhousing, i have said that blood was a very common result in the house. but you know, in addition to that roughhousing, the moment we left the house, we were also a band of brothers and defended each other. and we did live in a neighborhood where there were bullies and we had to defend ourselves and we were not shy

about that. >> so do you feel all of this anti-bullying, peaceful resolution stuff these days is making kids soft? >> i wouldn't go there. i do think bullying can be problematic and thankfully i would say in my family and many of our friends, had ari out there would not take anything from anybody and that i think is very important. >> that's why we love ari, that's why america loves ari, zeke thanks so much for your time. the book is "brothers emanuel" a memoir of an american family. late bloomers, maybe, zeke, but wow, what a rose garden you guys have created. coming up, to inhale or not to inhale? we'll look at the sea change in drug culture sweeping the country, next on "now." all stations come over to mission a for a final go.

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remember the war on drugs? >> this is your brain. this is drugs. this is your brain on drugs. any questions? >> how did the jokers, smokers and midnight tokers win over the hearts and minds of america? we'll discuss that next on "now." hoo-hoo. hoo-hoo...hoo-hoo. hoo-hoo hoo. sir... i'll get it together i promise... heeheehee. jimmy: ronny, how happy are folks who save hundreds of dollars switching to geico?

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nowhere is the nation's increasing tolerance on social issues seem more clearly than american attitudes towards marijuana. following a similar trajectory to that of same-sex marriage, according to a pew study released this month, for the first time ever pot legalization

is now supported by a majority of americans. another example of our increasing tolerance can be seen in our last three presidents. from bill clinton and his protestations of, i didn't inhale to george w. bush, who admitted to that he smoked marijuana and was widely suspected of dabbling in the harder stuff. to president obama who openly admitted to cocaine use and part of a chune gang. while marijuana still remains illegal. two states, colorado and washington, voted to legalize it and others are poised to follow suit. this interactive map from "atlantic" magazine shows how quickly marijuana laws have changed in the states since 1970. look at the greening of america, but marijuana is not the only drug in a state of legal limbo, in this week's cover story for "new york magazine," travels in the new psychedelic bizarre, we examine the new world of new

psychedelic drugs. these drug users imagine themselves as amateur chemists, proto walter whites, sampling and resynthesizing drugs to achieve exactly the state of consciousness they find most pleasurable. >> i feel like we've travelled to the way-back machine and are in the 1970s all over again. >> that's what's happening. social media is the disco of today and the whole culture is going '70s again. >> it's wild. it's a wild story and you talk about some of these drugs created. i have to say some of their names. bromo dragon fly, soma, merinol. f fujo. what's going on with the psychoin and opsych psychonauts? >> it turnpikes out that people want to experiment with every drug that you could possibly make and there are infinite combinations of molecules that

can be created to make a drug that alters your consciousness. >> and the internet helps facilitate this. >> you can buy them on the internet, it is extremely easy. most of the drugs, the actual chemicals, come from china. they can come straight to your mail box and you know, maybe you'd like to mix them up with a little speed or something like that it's a whole underworld that a lot of, quite frankly kids who don't even know drug dealers to buy these things really from. >> it is a brave new world in terms of drugs and drug use and attitudes, the the "huffington post," mat sledge has been doing some nice reporting for you guys on this in terms of support for legalization, the pew study. in 2010, 41% of americans support it. this year, 58. 50% say marijuana is not a moral issue, 72% say the government efforts to enforce laws are not

worth it. is the war on drugs over or ending? >> i think so when the drug war was launched, whether you date it to nixon or reagan, at that period of time, there hadn't been lifetime's worth of experience with any drug. cocaine, speed, heroin, were popular in the late 19th century, but they virtually disappeared. when they came back in the '70s, there wasn't this knowledge of what drugs were actually like. we're getting to the point now, where almost everyone alive has had marijuana as a major part of the culture for their entire lives which makes the government propaganda against it much more difficult to sink in and the same is true with a lot of psychedelics now. it's not the same with marijuana, but it's closer. you can't sensationalize them in the way that you used to be able to. that's why you see the aging out here. >> vanessa, it seems like the technology is ahead of the law here, right? at some point you've got to

think these drugs will be made illegal or at least they'll try to make them controlled substances. >> somebody said to me and it's true, drugs have won the drug war. right now, we can't control all the different drugs, that china can make and send over here. it's absolutely impossible. so that's why you see the federal government keeps on emergency schedule things all the time. >> it is an interesting front. we have to go, but bob, decriminalizing marijuana use, i think a lot of people, there's huge support for that. >> i want to let you know, i was there in the 1970s, be careful what you wish for. >> caveat from father time. all right that's it for us, thank you to ryan, vanessa, ben and bob. that's all for now, i'll see you back here monday at noon when i'm joined by former governor ed rendell and more, until then find us on facebook. "andrea mitchell reports" is next.

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